Chinese Smog and Censorship

Apparently Beijing is so polluted, there's a concern about athletes not giving peak performances. This primarily affects the endurance runs, swims and biking. Athletes will be wearing protective masks until the races begin.

The possible solution? Seeding the clouds. That's right. Sending a plane up to mess with nature, produce some rain and wash away the pollution temporarily. This isn't so much to protect the lungs of the athletes. It's to make sure we get good television. Apparently when the Olympics aren't there, no one is working on the pollution problem. God forbid we lose a few televised sporting events, though. Let's get science to work on that.

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Meanwhile, it has come to light that China will be censoring some journalistic reports during the Olympics, if the reports include information extraneous to the Games. Originally journalists were told they could report on the Games and any other issues in China without interference (i.e., clearance from the government).

The IOC says they didn't have the power to tell China what to censor and what not to censor. Why not? It's the Olympic Games. Either China wants to host them, or they don't. A likely explanation is that the IOC had leverage on China when the whole thing was being set up, but now that we are to the point where the IOC can't change locations, China decided it had the leverage.

Whoever selected Beijing as the site should have taken these factors into account.